Requirements
In order to submit your Rank Order List(s) by the deadline, all your applicant interviews must be completed before that deadline date.
Residency sites should provide to their applicants, prior to the Rank Order List deadline, complete information on the eligibility requirements for appointment that have been established by the residency site (e.g., required start date, background checks, etc.). Residency sites should also provide their program Code Number(s) to each of their applicants.
Residency sites that conduct interviews may decide which applicants they wish to interview. However, the site must make a reasonable effort to notify every applicant who submits a complete set of application materials as to their interview status. Such notification must occur in a timely manner, and no later than any interview notification date that appears in the residency site's public materials, and may be communicated via email, telephone, regular mail (to be received no later than the interview notification date), or other means. Residency sites that conduct open houses to which all applicants are invited and conduct no other interviews are exempt from this requirement (this exemption should be clearly stated in the sites' public materials).
Residency sites are urged not to consider the interview format as a factor when completing Rank Order Lists and to communicate this clearly to applicants.
Communication Guidelines
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Read APPCN Board Statement Regarding Applicant Participation and Preemptive Offers
The APPCN Board of Directors is concerned that some applicants are put in difficult situations where they are required to make early commitment to programs for positions that are not being offered through the Match. The APPCN Board of Directors believes these preemptive offers limit the choice of positions available to applicants and force some applicants to exit the recruitment process prematurely.
The APPCN Board of Directors has set rules for the Match to ensure that applicants have the ability to consider all options for their residency training in order to secure their most preferred placement. The rules allow applicants who receive preemptive offers from programs that do not participate in the Match to hold those offers and participate in the Match by submitting a Rank Order List of programs for the Match that the applicant prefers to the preemptive offer. The rules also allow programs to disclose their ranking intentions in advance of the APPCN Match to their most favored applicants who receive preemptive offers.
The APPCN Board is continuing to monitor this issue and is investigating other methods that may be implemented in subsequent years to mitigate preemptive offers. While this effort may not be as good as having all programs participate in the Match in the first place, the APPCN Board is striving to create a fairer and more robust recruitment environment, where applicants may pursue their most desired positions, and non-participating programs may be encouraged to join the Match to ensure they are able to fill their positions with desirable applicants.
According to the Residency Site Agreement and the APPCN Match Policies, Match participants may not communicate, accept or use any ranking-related information prior to the release of the APPCN Match results, and may never solicit such information even after the release of the APPCN Match results, except as specifically permitted in the APPCN Match Policies.
Residency sites that offer more than one program in the Match are expected to ask applicants to identify the program(s) to which the applicants are applying. However, residency sites may not solicit any information about applicants' rankings of these programs.
NMS Interview is an optional module of the NMS Match System that allows residency sites to streamline and automate interview scheduling.
Residency sites add their interview dates, import a list of their candidates, and send invitations online. The interview candidates self-schedule themselves into available timeslots. Both residency sites and candidates see their interview dates confirmed in real-time and get access to printable interview itineraries.